Open-FF1 has found a large number of chemical disclosures that misreport concentrations of fracking sand and water in Oklahoma. These errors seriously distort the chemical profiles of the fracking jobs.
We last reported sand-dominated disclosures from a company in Louisiana. Here, we consider an operator fracking wells in Oklahoma. As we pointed out in a recent post and shown in the first figure, the typical profile of fracking fluids is dominated by roughly 88% water, followed by 11% sand2 and the rest is chemical additives3. However, we’ve found many Oklahoma fracking disclosures that are dominated by sand instead. In this post, we detail problem disclosures from Citizen Energy, operating in Oklahoma.
As you can see from the next figure, most fracking jobs from Citizen Energy (empty circles) have sand percentages of about 10%. But for 34 disclosures (filled circles), sand makes up over half of the fluid4. As we outlined earlier, we believe these sand-dominated disclosures are an error. This fundamental error has ripple effects throughout the other records.
The masses of some ingredients appear to be wrong as well. For example, because these disclosures report the volume of water they use, we can also estimate the mass of that water5. In many of these disclosures, the mass reported in FracFocus in the MassIngredient column is much less than it should be based on the volume. Summary values are shown in table at the bottom of this post and fracking jobs are mapped here6:
FracFocus Support has informed us that they are preparing an alert to companies about these sand-based issues.7 We hope the company will correct these disclosures to reflect the actual percentages and masses used in those fracking jobs. Without accurate disclosures, FracFocus is not a trustable instrument. Open-FF monitors changes to FracFocus and we will update this post if Citizen Energy modifies these disclosures.
Disclosure list
Below is a list of the Oklahoma fracking disclosures for the company, Citizen Energy, that have sand percentages greater than 50%. Click on the API Number to view the FracFocus disclosure for that fracking job. Note the discrepancy between the expected water mass (in pounds) and reported mass in many of the disclosures.
| APINumber (and link) | County | job end date | Sand PercentHFJob | Expected water mass (pounds) | Reported water mass (pounds) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 35039225870000 | Custer | 2020-10-12 | 95.4 % | — | — |
| 35039225880100 | Custer | 2020-10-12 | 97.5 % | — | — |
| 35017256540000 | Canadian | 2021-04-22 | 98.3 % | 107,000,000 | 170,000 |
| 35017256530000 | Canadian | 2021-04-22 | 98.3 % | 109,000,000 | 170,000 |
| 35017256410000 | Canadian | 2021-06-10 | 97.7 % | 123,000,000 | 210,000 |
| 35017256560000 | Canadian | 2021-06-27 | 98.0 % | 175,000,000 | 280,000 |
| 35017256550000 | Canadian | 2021-06-27 | 97.8 % | 199,000,000 | 300,000 |
| 35017256400000 | Canadian | 2021-07-12 | 98.1 % | 114,000,000 | 170,000 |
| 35017256420000 | Canadian | 2021-07-12 | 98.0 % | 131,000,000 | 190,000 |
| 35017256380000 | Canadian | 2021-07-17 | 98.2 % | 53,000,000 | 81,000 |
| 35017256360000 | Canadian | 2021-07-20 | 98.0 % | 58,000,000 | 90,000 |
| 35087223110000 | Mc Clain | 2021-07-29 | 98.0 % | 88,300,000 | 120,000 |
| 35087223100000 | Mc Clain | 2021-07-29 | 98.0 % | 88,200,000 | 120,000 |
| 35087223130000 | Mc Clain | 2021-08-05 | 97.7 % | 78,800,000 | 150,000 |
| 35087223120000 | Mc Clain | 2021-08-08 | 97.7 % | 78,400,000 | 150,000 |
| 35017256620000 | Canadian | 2021-08-16 | 98.1 % | 104,000,000 | 170,000 |
| 35017256640000 | Canadian | 2021-08-17 | 97.9 % | 163,000,000 | 230,000 |
| 35017256630000 | Canadian | 2021-09-02 | 97.8 % | 233,000,000 | 340,000 |
| 35017256610000 | Canadian | 2021-09-03 | 97.8 % | 157,000,000 | 290,000 |
| 35017256600000 | Canadian | 2021-09-03 | 97.4 % | 49,300,000 | 85,000 |
| 35051248300000 | Grady | 2021-09-15 | 98.0 % | 132,000,000 | 210,000 |
| 35051248490000 | Grady | 2021-11-09 | 98.0 % | 203,000,000 | 280,000 |
| 35051248480000 | Grady | 2021-11-09 | 98.0 % | 204,000,000 | 290,000 |
| 35051248470000 | Grady | 2021-11-09 | 98.1 % | 205,000,000 | 280,000 |
| 35051248440000 | Grady | 2021-11-19 | 98.4 % | 91,000,000 | 140,000 |
| 35051248460000 | Grady | 2021-11-21 | 98.3 % | 120,000,000 | 200,000 |
| 35051248450000 | Grady | 2021-11-22 | 98.3 % | 121,000,000 | 200,000 |
| 35051248410000 | Grady | 2021-12-03 | 98.1 % | 155,000,000 | 280,000 |
| 35051248400000 | Grady | 2021-12-03 | 98.0 % | 163,000,000 | 300,000 |
| 35017256910000 | Canadian | 2021-12-22 | 98.4 % | 175,000,000 | 280,000 |
| 35017256920000 | Canadian | 2021-12-22 | 98.4 % | 176,000,000 | 290,000 |
| 35051248380000 | Grady | 2022-01-18 | 98.0 % | 175,000,000 | 300,000 |
| 35051248370000 | Grady | 2022-01-20 | 97.9 % | 128,000,000 | 250,000 |
| 35051248390000 | Grady | 2022-01-27 | 97.7 % | 146,000,000 | 320,000 |
- Open-FF is a public service project to foster better understanding of fracking chemicals disclosed at FracFocus. See the Open-FF home for more information and links to resources. ↩︎
- The CASRN for sand is
14808-60-7and is commonly called “crystalline silica, quartz” in FracFocus. ↩︎ - We’ve been told that foam-based carriers, that appear in about 2% of FracFocus disclosures, may tolerate more sand. These disclosures use carbon dioxide or nitrogen gases to replace a substantial fraction of the water carrier. None of the disclosures in this report use those gases. ↩︎
- The data for this analysis is from the Open-FF data repository created from a FracFocus bulk data download on July 18, 2024. ↩︎
- The mass of one gallon of water in 8.34 pounds. So, the mass of the water in a 10,000,000 gallon fracking job should be reported as 83,400,000 pounds, for pure water. If the water is not pure, the multiplier is typically larger than 8.34, but usually not by much. Differences in water density would not account for the large discrepancies in reported mass. ↩︎
- Click on colored circles with numbers to zoom in to individual well. Clicking on the marker provides more information. ↩︎
- Email to Gary Allison, August 1, 2024. ↩︎
Photo citation: Ted Auch, FracTracker Alliance, 2020. (modified by author)
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